2,949 research outputs found
Quantum private queries
We propose a cheat sensitive quantum protocol to perform a private search on
a classical database which is efficient in terms of communication complexity.
It allows a user to retrieve an item from the server in possession of the
database without revealing which item she retrieved: if the server tries to
obtain information on the query, the person querying the database can find it
out. Furthermore our protocol ensures perfect data privacy of the database,
i.e. the information that the user can retrieve in a single queries is bounded
and does not depend on the size of the database. With respect to the known
(quantum and classical) strategies for private information retrieval, our
protocol displays an exponential reduction both in communication complexity and
in running-time computational complexity.Comment: 4 pages, 1 figur
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Activity-dependent trafficking of lysosomes in dendrites and dendritic spines.
In neurons, lysosomes, which degrade membrane and cytoplasmic components, are thought to primarily reside in somatic and axonal compartments, but there is little understanding of their distribution and function in dendrites. Here, we used conventional and two-photon imaging and electron microscopy to show that lysosomes traffic bidirectionally in dendrites and are present in dendritic spines. We find that lysosome inhibition alters their mobility and also decreases dendritic spine number. Furthermore, perturbing microtubule and actin cytoskeletal dynamics has an inverse relationship on the distribution and motility of lysosomes in dendrites. We also find trafficking of lysosomes is correlated with synaptic α-amino-3-hydroxy-5-methyl-4-isoxazolepropionic acid-type glutamate receptors. Strikingly, lysosomes traffic to dendritic spines in an activity-dependent manner and can be recruited to individual spines in response to local activation. These data indicate the position of lysosomes is regulated by synaptic activity and thus plays an instructive role in the turnover of synaptic membrane proteins
Socioeconomic indicators of health inequalities and female mortality: a nested cohort study within the United Kingdom Collaborative Trial of Ovarian Cancer Screening (UKCTOCS)
Evidence is mounting that area-level socioeconomic indicators are important tools for predicting health outcomes. However, few studies have examined these alongside individual-level education. This nested cohort study within the control arm of the United Kingdom Collaborative Trial of Ovarian Cancer Screening (UKCTOCS) assesses the association of mutually adjusted individual (education) and area-level (Index of Multiple Deprivation-IMD 2007) socioeconomic status indicators and all-cause female mortality
Teaching Ethical Decision-Making in Counselor Education
How and when counseling graduate students are taught to apply ethical codes and principles varies. In this article the authors review foundational concepts and proposed practices for ethics education in graduate counseling programs. The authors present strategies for teaching ethical decision-making that focus on the intersection of personal values, principle and virtue ethics, and self-reflection. Recommendations are provided for content delivery and activities and assignments that encourage self-reflection of values in conjunction with the application of decision-making skills and models. Implications for future research are addressed
Teaching Ethical Decision-Making in Counselor Education
How and when counseling graduate students are taught to apply ethical codes and principles varies. In this article the authors review foundational concepts and proposed practices for ethics education in graduate counseling programs. The authors present strategies for teaching ethical decision-making that focus on the intersection of personal values, principle and virtue ethics, and self-reflection. Recommendations are provided for content delivery and activities and assignments that encourage self-reflection of values in conjunction with the application of decision-making skills and models. Implications for future research are addressed
Secret-Sharing for NP
A computational secret-sharing scheme is a method that enables a dealer, that
has a secret, to distribute this secret among a set of parties such that a
"qualified" subset of parties can efficiently reconstruct the secret while any
"unqualified" subset of parties cannot efficiently learn anything about the
secret. The collection of "qualified" subsets is defined by a Boolean function.
It has been a major open problem to understand which (monotone) functions can
be realized by a computational secret-sharing schemes. Yao suggested a method
for secret-sharing for any function that has a polynomial-size monotone circuit
(a class which is strictly smaller than the class of monotone functions in P).
Around 1990 Rudich raised the possibility of obtaining secret-sharing for all
monotone functions in NP: In order to reconstruct the secret a set of parties
must be "qualified" and provide a witness attesting to this fact.
Recently, Garg et al. (STOC 2013) put forward the concept of witness
encryption, where the goal is to encrypt a message relative to a statement "x
in L" for a language L in NP such that anyone holding a witness to the
statement can decrypt the message, however, if x is not in L, then it is
computationally hard to decrypt. Garg et al. showed how to construct several
cryptographic primitives from witness encryption and gave a candidate
construction.
One can show that computational secret-sharing implies witness encryption for
the same language. Our main result is the converse: we give a construction of a
computational secret-sharing scheme for any monotone function in NP assuming
witness encryption for NP and one-way functions. As a consequence we get a
completeness theorem for secret-sharing: computational secret-sharing scheme
for any single monotone NP-complete function implies a computational
secret-sharing scheme for every monotone function in NP
Optical detection of the Pictor A jet and tidal tail : evidence against an IC/CMB jet
Date of Acceptance: 12/06/2015New images of the FR II radio galaxy Pictor A from the Hubble Space Telescope reveal a previously undiscovered tidal tail, as well as a number of jet knots coinciding with a known X-ray and radio jet. The tidal tail is approximately 5″ wide (3 kpc projected), starting 18″ (12 kpc) from the center of Pictor A, and extends more than 90″ (60 kpc). The knots are part of a jet observed to be about 4′ (160 kpc) long, extending to a bright hotspot. These images are the first optical detections of this jet, and by extracting knot flux densities through three filters, we set constraints on emission models. While the radio and optical flux densities are usually explained by synchrotron emission, there are several emission mechanisms that might be used to explain the X-ray flux densities. Our data rule out Doppler-boosted inverse Compton scattering as a source of the high-energy emission. Instead, we find that the observed emission can be well described by synchrotron emission from electrons with a low-energy index (p ∼ 2) that dominates the radio band, while a high-energy index (p ∼ 3) is needed for the X-ray band and the transition occurs in the optical/infrared band. This model is consistent with a continuous electron injection scenario.Peer reviewedFinal Accepted Versio
Youth Use of E-Liquid Flavours – A systematic review exploring patterns of use of e liquid flavours and associations with continued vaping, tobacco smoking uptake, or cessation
Background and Aims:
There is concern that young people may be attracted to e-liquid flavours, prompting long-term vaping in naive users and potentially subsequent tobacco smoking. We aimed to review the use of e-liquid flavours by young people and describe associations with uptake or cessation of both regular vaping and tobacco smoking, adverse effects and subjective experiences.
Design:
Systematic review, including interventional, observational and qualitative studies reporting on the use of e-cigarette flavours by young people (aged < 18 years).
Setting:
Studies published in English language from any country or cultural setting.
Participants:
Young people and their carers (aged < 18 years).
Measurements:
A meta-analysis was not possible due to substantial heterogeneity, inconsistency in reporting of flavour categorizations and non-interventional study designs; thus, we narratively report findings.
Findings:
In total, 58 studies were included. The quality of the evidence was extremely low. Most (n = 39) studies were cross-sectional survey designs. In total, 11 longitudinal cohort studies assessed trajectories; eight qualitative studies reported on user experiences. Studies reported views and experiences of a total of 512 874 young people. Both cross-sectional and longitudinal studies suggested that flavours are important for initiation and continuation of vaping. Qualitative evidence shows interest and enjoyment in flavours. There was judged to be insufficient evidence that use of e-liquid flavours specifically is associated with uptake of smoking. No studies found clear associations between flavours and cessation in this population. We found no included reports of adverse effects of flavours.
Conclusions:
Flavours may be an important motivator for e-cigarette uptake, but the role of flavours in tobacco smoking uptake or cessation is unclear. The quality of the evidence on use of e-cigarette flavours by young people is low overall
New Outlook on the Possible Existence of Superheavy Elements in Nature
A consistent interpretation is given to some previously unexplained phenomena
seen in nature in terms of the recently discovered long-lived high spin super-
and hyper-deformed isomeric states. The Po halos seen in mica are interpreted
as due to the existence of such isomeric states in corresponding Po or nearby
nuclei which eventually decay by gamma- or beta-decay to the ground states of
210Po, 214Po and 218Po nuclei. The low-energy 4.5 MeV alpha-particle group
observed in several minerals is interpreted as due to a very enhanced alpha
transition from the third minimum of the potential-energy surface in a
superheavy nucleus with atomic number Z=108 (Hs) and atomic mass number around
271 to the corresponding minimum in the daughter.Comment: 8 pages, 8 figures, 5 tables. Paper presented at VII Int.
School-Seminar on Heavy Ion Physics, May 27 - June 1, 2002, Dubna, Russi
Gaps present a trade-off between dispersal and establishment that nourishes species diversity
We took advantage of two natural experiments to investigate processes that regulate tree recruitment in gaps. In the first, we examined the recruitment of small and large saplings and trees into 31 gaps resulting from treefalls occurring between 1984 and 2015 in the 2.25-ha core area of a 4-ha tree plot at Cocha Cashu in Peru. In the second, we identified the tallest saplings recruiting into 69 gaps created during a violent wind storm in February 2000. In the established tree plot, we were able to compare the composition of saplings in the disturbance zones of gaps prior to, during, and subsequent to the period of gap formation. Recruitment in gaps was compared with that in "nofall" zones, areas within the plot that had not experienced a treefall at least since the early 1980s. Our results confirmed earlier findings that a consistently high proportion (~60%) of established saplings survived gap formation. Light demanding species, as proxied by mortality rates, recruited under all conditions, but preferentially during periods of gap formation, a pattern that was especially strong among gap pioneers. Similar results were noted, separately, for small and large saplings and trees recruiting at >= 10 cm dbh. One hundred percent of previously untagged trees recruiting into gaps in the first post-disturbance census were gap pioneers, suggesting rapid development. This conclusion was strongly supported in a follow-up survey taken of 69 gaps 19 months after they had been synchronously created in a wind storm. Ten species of gap pioneers, eight of which are not normally present in the advance regeneration, had attained heights of 6-10 m in 19 months. The 10 gap pioneers were dispersed, variously, by primates, bats, birds, and wind and reached maximum frequency in different-sized gaps (range 1,000 m(2)). Both gap size and limited dispersal of zoochorous species into gaps serve as filters for establishment, creating a complex mosaic of conditions that enhances species diversity
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